Degeneration (Nordau)  

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Degeneration (Max Nordau) full text

"Max Nordau's Degeneration aims at being a literary nosology of the Decadent Movement, but it is completely discredited by its pseudo-erudition, its grossly positivist point of view, and its insincere moral tone." --Frank Kermode in the introduction to The Romantic Agony by Mario Praz.

Degeneration (1892) is a German language book by Max Nordau on the fin de siècle concept of degeneration. Although not his most popular or successful work whilst alive, it is the book most often remembered and cited today. Degeneration attempted to explain all modern art, music and literature by pointing out the degenerate characteristics of the artists involved.

Summary

Nordau begins his work with a 'medical' and social interpretation of what has created this Degeneration in society. Nordau divides his study into five books. In the first book, Nordau identifies the phenomenon of fin de siècle in Europe. He sees it as first being recognised, though not originating, in France, 'a contempt for the traditional views of custom and morality.' He sees it as a sort of decadence, a world-weariness, and the wilful rejection of the moral boundaries governing the world. He uses examples from French periodicals and books in French to show how it has affected all elements of society. Nordau accuses also society of becoming more and more inclined to imitate what they see in art. He sees in the fashionable society of Paris and London that 'Every single figure strives visibly by some singularity in outline, set, cut or colour, to startle attention violently, and imperiously to detain it. Each one wishes to create a strong nervous excitement, no matter whether agreeably or disagreeably.'

Nordau establishes the cultural phenomenon of fin de siècle in the opening pages, but he quickly moves to the viewpoint of a physician and identifies what he sees as an illness. 'In the fin-de-siècle disposition, in the tendencies of contemporary art and poetry, in the life and conduct of men who write mystic, symbolic and 'decadent' works and the attitude taken by their admirers in the tastes and aesthetic instincts of fashionable society, the confluence of two well-defined conditions of disease, with which he [the physician] is quite familiar, viz. degeneration and hysteria, of which the minor stages are designated as neurasthenia.'

The book deals with numerous case studies of various artists, writers and thinkers (Wilde, Ibsen, Wagner and Nietzsche to name but a few) but its basic premise remains that society and human beings themselves are degenerating, and this degeneration is both reflected in and influenced by art.

The Politics of Degeneration

Nordau did not himself coin the expression or the idea of Entartung; it had been steadily growing in use in German speaking countries during the 19th century. The book reflects views on a degenerating society held by many people in Europe at the time, especially throughout the Austro-Hungarian Empire. By the early 20th century, the idea that society was degenerating, and that this degeneration was influenced by art, led to somewhat hysterical backlashes, as evidenced by the conviction of Austrian artist Egon Schiele for "distributing pornography to minors".

This cultural construct, which could be used to describe anything which deviated in any way from accepted norms, was given legitimacy by the pseudo-scientific branch of medicine called 'psycho-physiognomy.' 'Degeneration' was accepted as a serious medical term. Not until Sigmund Freud, and the ushering in of a new age of psychoanalysis, was this idea seriously contested. Sigmund Freud remarked rather drily in his 1905 work Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, "It may well be asked whether an attribution of 'degeneracy' is of any value or adds anything to our knowledge."

Although Nordau's work certainly reflects a reactionary strain of European thought, he also condemns the rising Anti-Semitism of the late 19th Century as a product of degeneration. At the time of his writing, Europe was undergoing unprecedented technological progress and social upheaval. The rapid industrialisation and accompanying urbanisation were breaking down many of the traditional structures of society.

Nordau's views were in many ways more like those of an 18th Century thinker, a belief in Reason, Progress, and more traditional, classical rules governing art and literature. The irrationalism and amorality of philosophers such as Nietzsche or the flagrant anti-Semitism of Wagner, was seen as proof that society was in danger of returning to an era before the Enlightenment.

See also

• Cultural pessimism.